


The world where I was never here

by pantsless



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 05:42:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9164635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pantsless/pseuds/pantsless
Summary: "She’s pretty sure this isn’t what Cisco had in mind when he’d given her his universe-crossing transponder thing.This being skulking around an alternate version of National City looking for her sister."(Or: after Alex comes out to Kara, Kara decides to pay that alternate universe another visit.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Beyond Worlds](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8701648) by [justanexercise](https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanexercise/pseuds/justanexercise). 



> OKAY so I read justanexercise's awesome alternate universe fic a while back and I just couldn't get that concept out of my head, soooo this is what happened. I'm such a sucker for AU-/multiple-realities-type things and if there was anything good about that Legends/Superflarrow crossover, it's that it gave me this stupid idea to play with.
> 
> *Let’s just pretend the whole CW superhero crossover episode happened before Alex came out, and that by the time she told Kara, Kara already had a way to get to the Flash universe at will. 
> 
> **Also that Alex and Kara haven't yet had time to process their feelings after that first coming out scene at the park, because they were too busy fighting the bad guy of the week, or something. 
> 
> ***There’s going to be quite a bit of Alex/Maggie because I think Maggie is an important person in Alex’s life and her coming out arc, but it’s not going to be endgame. That being said, I’m going to try my best and do Maggie and Alex's relationship with her justice.

She heads to the hospitals first.

 

Not in her Supergirl costume, of course – she doesn’t want to draw undue attention. The last time she was here, someone managed to snap a blurry video of her in action on an iPhone. Apparently, Barry and the others were able to explain away the strange flying girl who could shoot lasers out of her eyes by chalking it up to alien-induced mass hallucination, or something, but she’s not going to risk altering the timeline by getting spotted again.

 

Plus, she’s pretty sure this isn’t what Cisco had in mind when he’d given her his universe-crossing transponder thing.

 

 _This_ being skulking around an alternate version of National City looking for her sister.

 

But Kara doesn’t have time to process the ethics of using cross-dimensional travel for non-world-saving purposes. This is the third and only hospital left in National City, and she’s already spent almost half a day hanging around the other two without much luck. This has got to be it.

 

Kara flips the page of the newspaper she’s pretending to read and takes a deep breath, willing herself to listen. Past the hospital chatter and beeping monitors and wheeling gurneys; down the hallways and corridors and into the wards; searching and flitting through every living being in this building for Alex – her voice, a laugh, or any mention of a “Dr. Danvers”–

 

“You know, honey, you’re not fooling anyone.”

 

The voice is clear, sharp, and seems to be coming from somewhere nearby. Kara jerks and crushes the edges of her newspaper, lowering it to locate the source. It’s coming from the middle-aged nurse behind the counter opposite Kara, who is currently watching her with knowing eyes.

 

“You’ve been sitting in that same seat for almost two hours now, so you might as well go ahead and tell me if I can help you with something,” she nods.

 

Kara hesitates. The nurse is still looking at her, but there is a tiny hint of a smile on her lips. Her eyes look sharp but kind.

 

“I– I’m looking for someone,” Kara says finally.

 

“Well, you sure aren’t going to find them by just sitting there pretending to read that newspaper,” the woman lowers her glasses conspiratorially, and Kara’s eyes widen at being caught. So much for being inconspicuous, she scolds herself.

 

“So, want to tell me who you’re looking for, or should I just go back to pretending I don’t see you sitting there?”

 

Kara lets out a breath. She considers, for a split second, asking this nurse about Alex. But then she remembers Flashpoint and the fact that she isn’t even supposed to be here in the first place, and panics when she realises she shouldn’t have been noticed at all. And Kara’s been here for hours. If she hasn’t managed to find Alex yet, it’s probably because Alex doesn’t actually work here.

 

“No, no, that’s okay. She’s not here. Thanks, though,” Kara says, hastily picks up her things, and leaves.

 

\--

 

Kara flies to the Danvers’ home next, mostly because she hasn’t got a clue where to go. In a universe where Kara had never crash-landed into Alex’s life via space pod, Kara was so sure this Alex would’ve gone and become a doctor eventually. Just like _her_ Alex, this one would probably be saving lives and being brilliant and badass and beautiful–

 

She slows down as she reaches the house, checking to see if Eliza is home. Kara finds her holed up in the Danvers’ study cum mini-laboratory, bent over a microscope. Which is great for Kara, because she knows from experience that an Eliza at work is an Eliza so absorbed that she probably wouldn’t notice if an alien entered her house looking for clues on where to find her daughter.

 

Kara quietly eases herself into an open window and takes a moment to gather her bearings, noiselessly hovering an inch above the ground. The house is mostly the same as she’d remembered it back on her Earth, but parts of it are out of place.

 

For one, her room isn't actually her room ( _of course_ ) but seems to be another study or library of sorts. Family pictures still hang along the walls, but without Kara around, most of them are of Alex.

 

Kara stops as she comes across one of a grinning Alex with her surfboard and frowns. It’s familiar because the Danvers’ hallway back on her Earth had this same photo of Alex at about the same age, but it’s also…different. Alex’s surfboard is red instead of blue, and her hair – which had been long on Kara’s Earth until she’d joined the DEO and had it cut – hangs short and shaggy-wet below her chin.

 

But there isn’t time to obsess over the length of teenage Alex’s hair or surfboard preferences. Kara has already spent much longer than she’d expected in this universe, and she knows from experience that every minute spent here is a minute away from her Earth. The last time she’d been off-world to help Barry fight the alien invasion, she’d come home to a very cross Alex demanding to know where she’d been and scolding her for not leaving a note.

 

Kara figures Alex’s room would be the best place to start, so she hovers down to the end of the hallway. She’s just shut Alex’s door quietly behind her when she hears the front door open and shut. Kara glances through the door at the lab across the hallway, but Eliza is still there so who could it- oh. _Oh._ Kara looks down in time to see Jeremiah start walking up the stairs.

 

Kara knew, of course, abstractly, that on this Earth Jeremiah would likely still be alive and safe, but seeing him in the flesh is completely different. She can’t help but watch as he heads straight to the lab as if he just knows that Eliza would be there. He bends down to peck a smiling Eliza on the mouth, in that casually couple-y way he always did, when Kara was a kid and before he had disappeared.

 

Kara’s fingers drift towards the lead-lined glasses in her back pocket, her throat thick.

 

It’s suddenly too much, and Kara really, _really_ shouldn’t be here, so she backs away from the door, away from Eliza and Jeremiah and this house that she knows so well but never lived in, and she fumbles to get the window open so she can get herself out of here.

 

\--

 

Kara doesn’t even realise where she’s going until she finds herself back in the city, two blocks away from Noonan’s. She’s still got an hour before she really needs to get back to her Earth, so she ducks inside.

 

Noonan’s looks exactly the same as it did back home (right down to the fact that Suzy’s on her regular Wednesday evening shift behind the bar) but after the day Kara’s had, she’s not sure if she finds it reassuring or discomfitting. Suzy takes her order with a polite smile and no recognition whatsoever, and Kara settles herself down at her usual spot.

 

Kara absently picks at the sticky buns on her plate. She’s starting to think it was a dumb idea to have come here in the first place. Honestly, she didn’t think it’d be that hard to find her sister, but here she is, 8 hours later, and still no Alex. She’s lucky she hasn’t been noticed (except that nurse, her brain supplies helpfully) and she should really be getting back soon before her people back home start to notice she’s–

 

“Hey, think I could steal that napkin over there?”

 

Kara blinks, snapping out of her thoughts at a familiar voice because _no, it can’t be,_ but it is, and she looks up to see Alex, smiling down at her.


	2. Chapter 2

Kara only realises she’s staring when she sees Alex’s smile falter. Alex awkwardly gestures at the napkin holder on Kara’s table. “Um, my table’s out, may I..?”

 

“Right. Sure! Yes, ah, go ahead,” Kara recovers quickly. She still can’t quite believe Alex is right here. She did, after all, spend an entire day looking for this woman.

 

Alex appears slightly amused as she reaches over to grab a napkin. “Thanks,” she says, and walks back toward her table.

 

Kara tries her best not to be too much of a creep, but surreptitiously sneaks glances in Alex’s direction. This Alex looks…well, she looks almost exactly like the Alex Kara knows back home. She’s wearing a black leather jacket that is identical to the one Alex owns back home, and skin-tight dark jeans.

 

Alex takes a swig from her drink and checks her phone. Kara suddenly realises that Alex is waiting for someone. A date, probably. Why else would she be here, alone, on a weeknight?

 

As if sensing Kara’s eyes on her, Alex starts to look up. Kara hastily looks away and takes another bite of her sticky buns, and desperately tries to act like a normal person who is absolutely not gaping at her not-sister from an alternate dimension. Which is kinda hard to do because her brain is racing a mile a minute. Kara came here to look for the Alex in this world – to see what she was like – but hadn’t actually planned on having to interact directly with her. Should she introduce herself, or–

 

Kara’s phone beeps. It’s the alarm she set herself before leaving her Earth, and she realises she is definitely out of time. She takes one last look at Alex before getting up to go.

 

\--

 

“So, what have we got?” Kara asks as soon as she reaches the DEO command centre. J’onn, Winn and Alex are gathered in front of the briefing screen, and all three look up at her arrival.

 

“Supergirl, just in time. Mr. Schott here was just briefing us on some anomalous radioactive signatures we picked up this morning,” J’onn says.

 

That’s Winn’s cue, and as he launches into what Kara has come to understand as his awkward-DEO-geek-mode, Kara’s attention wanders. Thanks to her little cross-dimensional jaunt, it’s been more than 24 hours since she’s last slept. Not that Kryptonians _need_ sleep, per se, but Kara is feeling a smidge less focussed than usual.

 

Or maybe that’s just her getting distracted by what happened last night. Or…last morning? Kara can’t decide what to call it, because apparently alternate Earths run on a different time zone too. She’d found that out the first time she’d been there to kick Dominator butt. Which is great because Kara could spend a whole day there looking for Alex, but back home it was basically just the night, and she was counting on no one noticing she was gone.

 

And no one did, which Kara was extremely grateful for as she lurched out of the portal into a nondescript alley that morning. She'd had 15 minutes before she was due to report for work, which was barely enough time to swing by her apartment for a change of clothes, and not give Snapper another excuse to fire her. She was half-expecting her phone to explode with missed calls and texts from Alex once she got back, but relieved when her phone only buzzed with a few email notifications. Kara supposed that shouldn't have been too surprising. She and Alex haven’t talked since that conversation at the park two days ago. It’s not like she’s avoiding Alex or anything, she’s just been busy, okay? And Alex is–

 

Currently giving her a look across the briefing table, Kara notes out of the corner of her eye. Alex’s arms are folded and her brows drawn together in an almost-frown. Great. It’s the same look she gets whenever she needs to talk to Kara about something, and Kara isn’t exactly enthused at the prospect of this particular conversation.

 

“…the radiation signatures don’t match any known substances from Earth either. Definitely alien, so we should definitely check that out,” Winn finishes.

 

“I’m on it,” Kara says quickly, almost flying in her haste to get out of the DEO, and refuses to think about how Alex’s eyes had looked a bit redder than usual.

 

\--

 

Alex leans over to carefully remove the radioactive material from Kara’s skin, and Kara winces. Kara was a bit tired today, and she’d let that alien terrorist get a bit too close. Close enough to be within spitting distance, to be exact. Just her luck too, because this particular one had radioactive spit.

 

Which is why she is here, back at the DEO, sitting on an examination table as Alex patches her up and J’onn watches.

 

“I think that’s the last of it,” Alex announces, and she studies Kara’s skin as it heals itself. “Thankfully, the damage doesn’t seem to be permanent.”

 

“Thank God for Kryptonian super-healing powers, right?” Kara offers weakly.

 

Neither J’onn nor Alex seem particularly impressed. “You were lucky this time, Supergirl, but that’s not always going to be the case,” J’onn says.

 

Kara ducks her head. She knows her reflexes were slightly slower today, because apparently she needs sleep more than she initially thought. She looks up at Alex, expecting more chastisement, but Alex is uncharacteristically silent.

 

On any other day, Alex would probably be chiding her for her carelessness too, but their mutual awkwardness seems to be dampening Alex’s more overt protective tendencies. As is, Alex simply turns away to put down her forceps her expression strangely unreadable.

 

Kara hops off the table. “Anyway, thanks for fixing me up, Alex. I should be getting back to Catco.”

 

Kara moves so fast she’s almost out the door when – “Actually, Kara, I was wondering if you had a moment. To talk?” Alex isn’t looking at her, choosing instead to carefully rearrange some of the medical gear at the workstation.

 

Kara freezes. She could make up an excuse and go, but J’onn is here, observant as ever, and she doesn’t want this to become A Thing. 

 

“O-okay. Sure.”

 

J’onn raises an eyebrow. He looks between the two of them before seeing himself out.

 

As soon as the door shuts, Alex turns around. “You’ve been acting weird ever since I told you,” she accuses.

 

Kara inhales. Alex has her hands folded again, but her shoulders are slightly hunched. Kara thinks, briefly, about the mimosa plants she’d seen once on an 8th grade school trip, and the way they shrank away from her fingers when she’d tried to touch them. She’d tried to unfurl the leaves with her hands, to unfold them carefully so they could get the sun, but Mrs Rodriguez told her that the more she tried to touch the plants, the more she’d hurt them.

 

Alex’s voice is deliberately steady now, “I know you’ve been freaking out about me being–“ but here she can’t quite keep the waver out of her voice – “t-that I like Maggie, and if you’re not okay with who I am–“

 

“No, no that’s not what–” Kara takes a halting step forward, “I’m totally okay with who you are, okay? I was just…surprised.”

 

Alex doesn’t respond. She just stares at the floor. Kara exhales.

 

“Okay, maybe I wasn’t just surprised. It’s just– after what you said, about Maggie and Vicki…it just got me thinking, y’know?”

 

Alex finally looks up, curious. Kara starts to pace.

 

“Ever since I got here, you’ve always been there for me. I’m really, really starting to see that now – especially after this past year – how everything has always been about protecting me, looking out for me. _There’s never been any room for you,_ ” Kara says, and her mouth twists because the second she gives voice to that last thought the truth of it seems to reverberate in her very bones.

 

Alex is still watching her.

 

Kara continues, because she’s not sure how she’s going to get the words out, but if she stops now she’s never going get them right. “A-and I’m so sorry for that. I’m sorry you felt like you had to keep this part of you shut off, and I’m sorry that you’ve had to spend your entire life looking out for me, that you didn’t have time to pay attention to yourself–”

 

But then suddenly Alex cuts her off by enveloping her in a crushing hug, and Kara just deflates, relaxing in Alex’s arms. For a moment, Kara allows herself to enjoy the feeling of being held, wrapped up in Alex’s comforting, familiar scent.

 

“Hey, hey, don’t apologise,” Alex soothes, “it’s not your fault.”

 

Something inside Kara snaps as she realises with growing horror that even though Alex has maybe just come out to her, _Alex is the one_ _comforting her_ , because she’s somehow gone and made this all about her, _again._

 

Kara straightens out of the hug and tells herself to pull it together. “But I wanted you to know that I’m here for you now, okay? I got you,” and Kara squeezes Alex’s hands tight. Alex’s smile is tight and watery.

 

“So, you _need_ to tell me about Maggie,” Kara says enthusiastically, and Alex lets out a shaky laugh, “But this is probably not the right time or place, and I really do have to get back to work. Dinner later, my place? I’ll get pizza.”

 

Alex looks like she can’t stop beaming as she nods. Kara’s heart swells.

 

“Okay then, see ya later,” Kara says and makes to leave. She’s almost left the room when Alex’s voice stops her again.

 

“Kara– I’m glad you came to live with us. So…please don’t be sorry about that, okay?”

 

That Alex is trying to comfort her again makes Kara feel even worse, and, unbidden, the self-loathing rises up like bile in her throat. But Alex doesn’t need any of her bullshit right now. Alex needs her sister.

 

So Kara forces a small smile and nods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wheeee another chapter! I'd mostly had this written, hence the quick update, but the rest will likely come a bit slower.
> 
> Just wanted to give another shoutout to @justanexercise, who's been really gracious and encouraging about me running off with a similar Kara meets AU!Alex premise :3 If you haven't already done so, please go check out their fic, Beyond Worlds!


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